Morning Glory

You can’t help but compare Morning Glory to Broadcast News, the latest newsroom movie with Rachel MacAdams and Harrison Ford. Of course, this movie does quite live up to Broadcast News which was about serious news, but focused on Holly Hunter’s character, Jane. But the juxtaposition between serious news and fluff is still at work in Morning Glory, a movie about a slight morning show that rivals the Today show that is losing in the ratings. Rachel McAdams’ character Becky Fuller is given the task of raising the ratings of this silly show. Her co-anchors are played by Dianne Keaton (always funny!) and Harrison Ford, who she persuades to join morning TV even though he has only ever done serious news. The conflict between perky Becky and grave Ford’s character, Mike Pomeroy is one of the funniest things about the movie. Also, I loved the way McAdams bounced through movie with a cheerleader’s glee. I think she’s great in this movie and is what makes the movie worth watching. The downer of the movie is that fluff wins – the movie seems to celebrate the truly stupid of TV. Anyway, Morning Glory’s no Broadcast News, but pretty fun. Will it get added to some of my all time favorite newsroom movies (see sidebar?), probably not.
Favorite Newsroom Movies:
Broadcast News, Who's the devil?
His Girl Friday, Oldie but a goodie
Zodiac, spooky but good
Shattered Glass, answers the question What if I made it up?

State of Play, the miniseries

State of Play is in theaters now with Russel Crowe, Ben Affleck, and Rachel McAdams. The movie is based on a BBC mini-series by the same name. I was very interested in this movie, loving a good newsroom story as I do, (see side bar for great newsroom movies) but thought that first I should see the miniseries. So I did. The BBC version is a 6 part series with great stalwart British actors such as Bill Nighy, and new on the scene super cute actors like James McAvoy. It tells the story of a friendship between a politician and a journalist and a murder of the politician,s lover. It’s a fast paced drama with intrigues around every corner and a team of journalists working together to solve the mystery. Kelly McDonald plays the Scottish cub reporter who is so darn cute (I can see Rachel McAdams in this part) and is great in the part. Bill Nighy as always is hilarious as the newspaper editor. This movie was pretty darn entertaining. It took a while to get used to the accents but in the end very enjoyable. I am now very curious about how they will make this 6 hour min-series into a 2 hour movie, Hollywood style. I’m sure it will not be as good, she said cynically, but I still want to see it.

Newsroom Movies

I like newsroom/ newspaper movies/ Journalism Movies -- some great ones are

Of course, All the Presidents Men
Broadcast News, Who's the devil?
His Girl Friday, Oldie but a goodie
Zodiac, spooky but good
Shattered Glass, answers the question What if I made it up?

What else?

Zodiac

I just saw Zodiac, out on DVD, a movie about a real-life serial killer, The Zodiac, who killed during the sixties and seventies in the San Francisco Bay area. Really though the movie is about a cartoonist who becomes obsessed by the case and later writes two books about it. Jake Gyllenhaal plays the cartoonist -- supporting characters of note are Mark Ruffalo as the beleaguered detective, and fellow newspaper man Robert Downey Jr. deliciously playing the role of the newspaper man gone nutty over case -- he's got some great lines in this movie. He actually becomes a completely destroyed alcoholic, which is interesting given Downey's problems with substance abuse. When I first started watching the movie I was giddy with excitement. I love movies set in a newspaper room, and I love movies where their is an intriguing problem for the actors to chew on. However, the movie kinda strays as it goes on and you start to wonder why the cartoonist is getting so obsessed, he even gets his kids in on solving the mystery of the killer's identity, but all in all Zodiac is worth watching even though it has a less than satisfying ending.